Short Circuit
by v-volatile
Summary: Trinity gets all angsty with her past and all close with Neo, of course. Takes place about 4 months after the end of the film, with some new crew members.


It all started as a routine run in the Matrix. Just a training exercise, to sharpen the skills of both the new and the experienced, and to provide some down time for the leaders. In fact, it was during the downtime that the crisis occurred. Trinity, Neo, and Morpheus were sitting in the bar of their favorite club in the basement of a warehouse in New York, idly discussing things and enjoying the taste of their alcohol, even though they knew it wasn't real. Suddenly, something happened. Trinity's left hand became interspersed with static, the familiar vision of skin replaced with surging white noise. Neo pulled out his phone and called Tank, all the while staring at Trinity's hand. They hurried out of the club and into the alley behind it, trying to hide Trinity from the other patrons.  
  
"What is that?" Tank asked, frantically tapping at his keyboards and eyeing the screen to his left. He felt something was wrong.  
  
"TANK! Trinity's ghosting," Neo's voice came in answer over the line, rather panicked and rising in volume. Trinity stood before him, her entire form now blurred with static and white noise, an expression of fear and revulsion on her face.  
  
"Wait…oh, dammit! Her control box is overloaded. Must be some sort of virus," Tank said to himself, typing faster. "Neo, hang on, I'm working on it," Tank said into his headset.  
  
In the Matrix, Neo stared at Trinity, pulse racing, palms sweating. The others stood around him, all characteristically clothed in sleek black leather. Even the combined force of the eight crewmembers- Morpheus, Neo, Trinity, Slip, Phase, Era, Orion and Romy- couldn't help in this situation. Slowly Trinity began disappearing, her body turning into mist and then air.  
  
"Tank! She's gone," Neo said, grief-stricken. That was his luck- just after he starts to really fall in love with Trinity she disappears.  
  
"Neo! Hold on. I have her safe back on the Neb. She's unconscious, but alive. I think she took a shock to the plug in her head when the control box overloaded. I'm taking her to the medical bay," Tank said, lifting Trinity's limp form from her chair and walking to another deck, where he settled her on a bed in the center of the room. After hooking up a few electrodes, an IV, and an alarm that would go off in case she went into critical condition, Tank returned to the operator's console and proceeded to find an exit for the rest. Soon the entire crew was back in the real world.  
  
"What happened? Morpheus, why did we get pulled out so quickly?" Romy asked, rubbing his neck and stamping his feet to restart circulation.  
  
"Something happened to Trinity. She started ghosting, right there in the club, but Tank unplugged her before she completely wiped out," Morpheus said.  
  
"Where is she?" Neo asked Tank, a worried look in his eyes. Tank gestured towards the medical bay and turned back to Morpheus.  
  
"Phase, Romy. I want you two to help take care of Trinity. Tank, Orion, can you please find out what caused the overload? We can't let it happen again. Era, Slip- you are going back to training. I saw how the combat against those agents went before Trinity's accident and you both have room to improve, yes?" Morpheus said, smoothly taking command and sending a pair of people to each part of the ship. He then went to talk to Neo.  
  
"Oh god…" Neo stood, bent over Trinity's limp form. She lay on the sterile blue bed in the middle of the medical room. Phase and Romy moved behind him, assembling things and washing their hands. He took no notice of their presence. Instead, his mind took him to the day he met Trinity.  
  
"I know why you live alone, why you sit at your computer night after night…it's the question that drives us…you're looking for the answer…it's out there…" Neo stared down onto Trinity' closed eyes, remembering exactly how she looked that night, pale, beautiful and fragile in the sallow illumination of the dance floor. He remembered her gently whispering in his ear, inciting curiosity, and then leaving, making him want to follow her and ask more questions. But the scary part was here, where she lay unmoving, her delicate eyelids seemingly fused shut. Will she ever wake up? Neo thought irrationally.  
  
"Neo. Neo," Morpheus said, shaking Neo by the shoulder.  
  
"Yes?" Neo said. He looked and sounded tired. There were dark half- moons underneath his eyes.  
  
"You have to go now. Phase and Romy can't work around you. If you want you can stay up with Tank and whoever's doing next watch but I recommend getting some sleep," Morpheus said, leading Neo out of the medical bay. "I know you're taking this hard. We all are. But you have to pull through. It's what Trinity would have wanted, Neo," Morpheus said, turning to leave. Neo shivered, slowly making his way through the bridge and past the core of the Neb.  
  
'What she would have wanted?' Morpheus speaks of her as if she's dead, Neo thought to himself with a shiver.  
  
That night, Neo lay alone on his bunk. It was cold. It was always cold in the real world, unless you lived in Zion. Usually, Neo would fall asleep soon after lying down but tonight he was unnerved. He was used to sleeping next to Trinity, sharing her warmth. He didn't fall asleep for another 3 hours.  
  
In the medical bay, Trinity was recovering. Under the close watch of Romy and Phase, she had woken up once, only to be informed of her condition. After staying awake a few minutes and inquiring after Neo and Morpheus, exhaustion took over and she went back to sleep. Romy sat in a chair in front of the medical console, sedately monitoring life signs, his thoughts wandering. Next to him, Phase was sound asleep, her head resting on Romy's shoulder. Without registering the action, Romy absentmindedly slid his arm around her.  
  
Morpheus lay awake in his room, wondering where the virus that shorted out Trinity's control box hand come from. It was hard to imagine Tank hadn't caught it sooner, so it must have been a very well encrypted length of code. Poor Tank…he thought it was his fault.  
  
Era and Slip were up late. They practiced sparring in the Construct, with Orion on night watch, running the program for them. Tank was asleep. In truth, Era didn't care about her combat skills to be up this late- she just wanted to do something with Slip. He felt the same way. Their subtle, almost unnoticed advances on each other were not missed by Tank, who was the gossipmonger on the ship. Every time he saw them he snickered. They reminded him of the late Apoc and Switch, who had done mostly the same thing during their time on the Neb.  
  
In his dreams, Tank was standing in the Matrix. Trinity was with him. He looked around for the others, but it was just the two of them, not even Neo. An agent was holding Trinity by the arm, a gun to her head. Trinity was screaming for him to come and help her, but when he tried to run he couldn't move. He looked down. The pavement, or whatever it was, was oozing around his feet and locking him in place. Soon he too was screaming. "I can't help you," He cried out to Trinity in his dream. "I'm stuck! I can't move." Suddenly, Tank woke up. The bare metal walls of his room on the Neb replaced the Matrix in his dream. As he lay back, breathing hard and trying to get a grip on reality, one phrase echoed through his mind- I can't help you. I can't help you.  
  
***  
  
"Unnnhh. Ow, my head! Phase? Romy?" Trinity woke to the sharp lights of the medical bay and the seemingly loud hum of the Nebuchadnezzar in motion. Once, she had taken no notice of the sound. When did it get so loud? She wondered.  
  
"Good morning, Trinity. Need a painkiller?" Romy asked, gently lifting Phase's head off his shoulder and crossing the room to ready a syringe.  
  
"Yes," Trinity said, her mind wandering. She gently reached back to touch the plug at the bas of her skull. It was hot! Weird, she thought. Suddenly she felt Romy's cool hands taking her pulse and administering a shot of morphine to the large vein in her neck. Ahhh. The headache ebbed away as things began to focus.  
  
"What happened? Why is my input jack warm?" Trinity asked, looking around and trying to get out of the bed. As soon as she put her weight on her feet, however, she crumpled to the ground. "Shit!" She exclaimed, climbing back onto the bed and contenting herself with sitting for the moment.  
  
"Well…there was an encrypted virus released into our hardline while you were in the Matrix. Tank thinks it was purposely aimed at you, because it went straight to your control box and proceeded to overload it. You took a nasty shock to the cerebral cortex, Trinity. A couple hundred volts went through your input jack. You'll be weak and unsteady on your feet for a few days, and you might slip in and out of consciousness a little too. But don't be too worried, Phase and I ran some tests and we think you'll be able to jack into the Matrix in about 3 or 4 weeks," Romy said, disposing of the syringe. As he walked over to Phase and whispered in her ear to wake her, Trinity thought about the news. No entry into the Matrix for 3 weeks? How will I do anything? I'm not operator, like Tank, she thought to herself.  
  
"You're awake," Neo said, suddenly appearing in the doorway. Romy and Phase exchanged looks and hurried out, muttering something about Morpheus wanting to see them. Neo watched them go, then closed the hatch and burst out laughing. "They're really bad liars. Morpheus isn't even up yet," he said, making Trinity smile.  
  
"They told me what happened. Romy said I won't be able to jack in for 3 weeks," Trinity said, making a face and sighing. Neo sat down on the bed next to her, and she leaned against him.  
  
"That's not that bad. It reassures me- you have less of a chance of being killed. Besides, you can help Tank out, and do training with Era and Slip, too. I'm sure Morpheus will find something…" Neo said, trailing off.  
  
"Hmm. I don't know, it's just that I feel useless when I can't enter the Matrix," Trinity said thoughtfully. Neo put his arm around her, and all rational thoughts were lost as they kissed. But they broke apart when someone knocked on the door.  
  
"Who is it?" Trinity called, rolling her eyes. They never got a minute to themselves.  
  
"Tank. I gotta talk," Tank said, his voice muffled by the steel door.  
  
"Uh, could you come back in ten minutes? I'm not quite awake," Trinity lied. Kissing Neo could wake her anytime.  
  
"Sure, whatever. I'll be back," Tank said. Only when the two heard Tank's retreating footsteps did they start kissing again. "Neo, can you leave before Tank comes and not let him see you? You know how much our Operator loves to gossip…" Trinity giddily whispered into Neo's ear a few minutes later, resting her warm cheek on his shoulder.  
  
"Sure. I'll go now. It's been eight minutes," Neo said, quietly sneaking out the door after giving Trinity one last passionate kiss on the neck. She carefully stood up, and using the bed for support walked closer to the door. Her legs felt weak. She leaned against the bed and finger combed her hair, the flush fading from her face. Being around Neo got her like that. Even after a year of being with him, he still had the power to make her giddy, nervous, and slightly incoherent when they were together in private.  
  
"Trinity? Can I come in?" Tank said, at the door again.  
  
"Sure, go ahead." Trinity said.  
  
"Look, I'll just say it right out. I'm sorry I didn't catch that virus before it got to your control box. I saw it coming, but I wasn't sure what it was. I heard Romy and Morpheus talking, and I know you'll be out of action for three weeks, so if you want, you can be operator for a while, or do training or something. I'm sorry, Trinity. I really am," Tank said, standing in front of the closed door, gripping the handle behind his back and eyeing the floor nervously.  
  
"Don't be sorry. It wasn't you fault. Whoever sent that knew you were operating and simply encrypted it accordingly. You had nothing to do with my injury, Tank. Don't worry," Trinity said, moving to the door. "I don't blame you, even if someone else does. Now, let's go get some breakfast," she said walking out of the medical bay still slightly unsteady on her feet.  
  
***  
  
Trinity and Neo stood next to each other in front of the mess hall sink, both smiling dreamily. Trinity slowly washed the spoons and bowls from breakfast wanting to make the job last as long as possible, and therefore, making her able to spend more time with Neo.  
  
"'I'm not quite awake'," Neo said, jokingly imitating Trinity from the scene inside the medical bay earlier that morning. They both laughed.  
  
"Trin?" Orion called from outside the mess hall. "Someone's here to see you," he said, his words followed by retreating footsteps.  
  
"What?" Trinity said to herself, trying to remember anyone who'd want to visit her on the Neb. She didn't know any people from Zion.  
  
"Hello, Trinity." A man in the simple tattered gray sweatshirt and green fatigues of the Nebuchadnezzar's sister ship the Napoleon stood on the main deck, hands behind his back, smiling. Orion, Era and Romy stood behind him, each holding some tool, caught in their actions. Morpheus, Slip, Tank and Phase appeared behind them, confused stares on their faces.  
  
"Hi. Who are you, exactly?" Trinity stepped towards the man warily. Neo appeared behind her.  
  
"I'm Mars. Your brother," the man said, opening his eyes a little wider, hoping she'd recognize him.  
  
"What? I never…no one…I'm sorry, you're mistaken. I'm an only child. I don't have a brother, uh...Mars," Trinity said, backing away and bumping into Neo.  
  
"Did your father ever tell you anything? No, I suppose he didn't…but did he?" The man asked, wringing his hands, his poise suddenly lost.  
  
"My father? No," Trinity said, her eyes taking on a hard quality. "Who let him in here? Are we docked with the Napoleon?" She queried, mostly to Morpheus, who stood, still in shock, near the back of the room.  
  
"I let him in. Yes, we are docked, but not for long. The Napoleon needs to leave. Decide if Mars stays or leaves. Hurry," Morpheus said, trying to remain neutral under Trinity's angry glare.  
  
"He leaves. I have no brother. This is a lie, and an unexpected one at that," She said coldly, walking off the bridge.  
  
"Oh god. I should have seen that coming," Mars said, grabbing his head in his hands. Neo watched him, detached. And while staring he noticed the man's hair and eyes were exactly like Trinity's. "Shit." Neo ran out of the main deck after her.  
  
Who the hell does he think he is? My father had another kid? What? Trinity thought to herself, leaning against the wall of a side hallway off the main deck, trying to compose herself.  
  
"Hey. Wait," Neo said, suddenly lurching into the hallway.  
  
"What?" Trinity said in a tone that brooked no argument.  
  
"He looks like you. He has the same hair and eyes, you know," Neo said, quieter now, smoldering under her gaze.  
  
"I know," Trinity said, rubbing her eyes. Suddenly, after that one innocent comment, it'd all come back. Her life before Morpheus.  
  
She could just see it now- a scrawny, thin, short version of herself sitting on a ratty couch, intently watching some late night TV. Just as she reached for the remote to turn up the volume, her father comes banging through the door of her apartment, holding a nearly empty bottle of Jack Daniels and screaming at her mother. Then the sick sound of glass shattering and flesh hitting flesh. The TV is mute now, going unnoticed. She stalks into the room and attacks her father in defense of her mother only to be met by more blows and a bruise on her left cheek. The same bruise that her hacker friends would question her about the next day.  
  
"Hey." Suddenly Trinity snapped back to the present, Neo standing beside her, holding her arm and looking at her intently, a worried expression on his face.  
  
"Please give him a chance, okay? Just one chance. Maybe he really is your brother…he bears a resemblance. And if you don't want him around he can go back on the Napoleon, right?" Neo said, trying to make light of the situation.  
  
"Fine," Trinity said. She rejoined the crew and Mars on the main deck.  
  
"I will give you one chance. I doubt it, but this may be true. Phase, can you check his DNA? Do we have equipment for that?" Trinity asked turning to Phase, the ship's doctor.  
  
"Yeah, we do. It'll take a few days, though, so he has to stay…" Phase trailed off nervously. All eyes turned to Trinity. "Can I?" Mars asked, pleading.  
  
"Yes," Trinity said resignedly, seeing that she'd caught herself with the question about DNA. There was no way out of this. Mars took a deep breath, nodded, and politely thanked everyone. As he carried in a bag and laptop from the docking port of the Napoleon, a problem arose.  
  
"Where should I sleep?" Mars asked. He knew that there were only 9 rooms aboard the ship and the Nebuchadnezzar had a full crew.  
  
"Ah, good question. You know what?" Neo said, jumping the opportunity, "I can share a room with Trinity, so you can use mine," he finished, smiling after turning away to empty his possessions from his room. Tank snickered and Morpheus permitted himself a rare, toothy smile.  
  
"Oh man. I don't know the hell I'm going to do with him, Trinity said to Era, who had moved to stand next to her. Era smiled. "Your luck," she said with a suggestive wink.  
  
"Is he your brother, Trinity?" Morpheus asked, coming over by her after Era left.  
  
"I honestly don't know. My father was married before he found my mom, but I don't think I had any step siblings…" That was a scary thought. Scary as hell. The last thing she needed was a reminder of her father intruding on her real world life.  
  
"Good luck with…things," Morpheus said, nodding at her.  
  
"Thanks."  
  
***  
  
It was dinner. Mars sat eating slop, staring at his food. He didn't meet Trinity or Neo's eyes when they walked in. As they got their share of the slop, Neo sat next to Trinity and turned to give her a look that said, are you going to speak to him?  
  
"Did you…know about me before I was unplugged?" Trinity asked, pushing her food around and finally making eye contact.  
  
"I…ah, I was aware, but…" Mars said, flustered.  
  
"You knew. You knew and you never came to visit. Never," Trinity said coldly.  
  
"Wait, wait. I wasn't able. I didn't know where you were. I didn't know…" Mars finished, realizing his own folly.  
  
"So did you 'know' about my father? His tendencies?" Trinity said. At this point, even Neo was lost. Era and Slip filed in to get their dinner, looking tired but very content. Orion followed, rolling his eyes.  
  
"Tendencies? What?" Mars asked, blinking in surprise.  
  
"Come on. Outside, now," Trinity said, getting up and grabbing Mars by the arm, leaving her dinner untouched. As he was dragged out the door, he looked to the others in the room for help. He was met with cold stares. No one crossed Trinity, especially about her family. Rumor had it that Trinity's life before her unplugging had been painful- even a nightmare. No one brought it up.  
  
"What the hell is wrong with you? How do you know my father without knowing he beat my mother to a pulp every night?" Trinity hissed, her cold eyes boring holes into Mars' frightened ones.  
  
"How can you say that of him? He raised me! I would have been a poor homeless person if it weren't for him!" Mars countered, standing up straighter- but still looking away.  
  
"Homeless. Poor. Try DEAD! My mother shot herself in the head thanks to your- your- savior, you jerk." With this inflammatory statement Trinity headed back to the mess hall and ate- in five minutes flat. Shortly afterwards, she got up and left to take watch, fairly pushing an indignant Slip off the console. As she put on the headset and began typing, Neo was the only one who saw her wipe a renegade tear from her eye.  
  
***  
  
"What did you say to Mars? He never came back to eat," Neo said, dropping some clothes on the chair for Trinity's computer in her room. Like the others on the Neb, her quarters were a simple affair: steel walls, a hatch-like metal door, a chest of metal drawers, a single lamp, a small bed with a thin mattress and a metal railing on the headboard and footboard, and a lone computer on a rickety wooden table in the corner. The nicest thing in the room was the chair, (which was tattered as well,) new compared to the bed and the lamp.  
  
"That idiot was referring to my father as some sort of saint. He said that he would be homeless and poor if my dad hadn't helped him out. But he neglected to notice the man he sees as his savior was the same man that convinced my mother to kill herself. Jerk," Trinity muttered, putting her boots in the corner. Neo pondered this, pulling off his sweater and socks.  
  
"Wait a second. Start from the beginning, okay? You forget this is one of the few things you never told me," Neo said quickly smiling to himself. Trinity had told him a lot in the past.  
  
"Well…okay. But promise me you won't tell anyone- especially not Tank. Please not Tank!" Trinity said, sitting down on her bed, her back resting against the wall. Neo joined her. "I promise," he said, laughing over the joke about Tank.  
  
"From the beginning," Trinity said, taking a deep breath.  
  
"As soon as I began acting independently, even as a small child, I showed interests my parents didn't understand. Like computers, and hacking. I was a loner, except around people who enjoyed the same things I did. I rarely paid attention in school. I got bad grades, broke rules consistently. Needless to say, it made them mad. My mother would try to cajole me, try to convince me I couldn't have a future until I cleaned up my act. I knew better. I saw the future was Morpheus. My father, on the other hand, attempted to beat a good future out of me.  
  
"He was a physical person. He would beat my mother if he thought she was cheating on him, or doing something he didn't like. He would beat anyone he could if things weren't to his liking. I would try to protect my mother, threaten to call the police on him. But I never did- for two reasons: he'd either beat me to keep me from doing it or I wouldn't report him because I kept telling myself he would change. He never did.  
  
"It drove me insane. The worse things got at home, the worse I got. I skipped classes; I went to visit my hacker friends more. I intensified my search for Morpheus. I began breaking bigger laws. It was just before my father got his worst when I ripped apart the IRS database. So, as I got closer to freedom, I got farther from my family. Until one night…  
  
"That was the night when Morpheus had called me while I was at a friend's place and asked me to meet him, late, at maybe 2 or 3 in the morning. I went home to get my things, thinking to myself, this is the last time I have to deal with this crap. I came home, and there it was- the worst kind of domestic violence. My father was sitting on the couch. I sneaked past him into my room, intending to escape unnoticed.  
  
"But as I went upstairs, I saw my mother in, sitting in her room, covered in bruises, nursing a long bloody cut across the right side of her face. That was the straw that broke my back. I saw this- the worst my father's ever done, and just broke.  
  
"I went downstairs and confronted my father. He blew up and attacked me. I was screaming, screaming loud enough to wake the dead although I knew no one could hear me, while he kicked me and shoved me around. I couldn't do anything for protection. He'd always been twice my size.  
  
"My mother appeared in the doorway. I turned to see her just as she took out my father's revolver and shot herself, point-blank in the chest. I saw the blood and my mother's face and ran out of my house screaming.  
  
"I never came back. I went to the meeting with nothing to lose and nothing to gain, since my Matrix life had been shattered before my eyes. Morpheus freed me that night. But even if he hadn't- even if that was just a preliminary meeting- I still wouldn't have gone home. I would have been homeless and poor, starving and dirty, but I would never have gone home. Never." Trinity was sitting curled up against the wall, her knees drawn up to her chin. She put her head down and cried silently, not wanting even Neo to see her in her weakest hour.  
  
"Mars needs to hear that, Trin," Neo said gently, slipping his arm around Trinity and kissing he on the top of the head.  
  
"I know. I'm not going to tell him everything. He probably won't believe me anyway," Trinity muttered, vigorously rubbing her eyes and moving to lie down, now thoroughly exhausted.  
  
"I think he will," Neo said, lying down next to her and keeping his arm around her. He understood now- why Trinity fought with such precision and grace and drive. She probably saw the face of her father in every agent, every time she went into combat.  
  
***  
  
Trinity woke up, pressed close against Neo, something nagging the back of her brain. "Neo," she whispered, nudging him.  
  
"Hmmm?" Neo responded sleepily, his eyes not quite shut.  
  
"I have to go finish something. I'll be back in a minute, okay?" Trinity said, kissing Neo on the cheek and going to dress. After pulling a sweatshirt and running her hands through her unruly black hair, Trinity quietly slipped out of her room and walked across the hall- to Mars' room. She knocked twice, fully expecting someone to open the door.  
  
"Who is it?" Mars called, sounding awake.  
  
"Trinity."  
  
"Oh…come in, I suppose," Mars said, setting something down and going to the door. Trinity opened it first and leaned casually against the doorframe so Mars wouldn't ask her inside. That would be awkward.  
  
"Look, Mars. I'm sorry about last night. I didn't mean to hurt your feelings, but this hasn't been brought up for a long, long time," Trinity said. It was early morning. She stood in the doorway of Mars' room, her hands clenched behind her back.  
  
"So what is your side of the story anyway?" Mars asked guardedly. Trinity sighed and told him an abbreviated version of the same story she'd told Neo. She bit her tongue and squeezed her hands together to keep herself from crying. That was the last thing she needed- to cry in front of Mars. He waited a moment, thinking, a worried look on his face. Finally he stared up at Trinity, a wounded look on his face.  
  
"What? How can you say that about him? How?" Mars asked, outraged. Trinity rolled her eyes, thinking, what a stiff-assed idiot. How can you blah, blah, blah.  
  
"Well, I thought things would improve between us if I explained this to you, but I guess not," Trinity said, arching an eyebrow and regally turning to walk out of the room.  
  
"You…" Mars hissed, raising his arm in anger, just as Trinity felt a sharp, painful stinging sensation across the small of her back. She turned.  
  
"You slapped me." Saying the words hurt more than feeling the sensation.  
  
"So? What are you going to do? Run to Neo? Tell on me to Morpheus?" Mars snickered tauntingly. He was past limits and he knew it, but he was also enjoying himself.  
  
"I'm going to kick your ass, that's what. One slap is all it takes, O God of War. War you'll have. I'm not the same little innocent I was as a slave in the Matrix. Be in the Construct, at noon today. Everyone will watch," Trinity hissed, turning and walking away. She paused for a moment at the end of the hall.  
  
"And you'd do well to remember that the only one above me on this ship is Morpheus," She added with a smirk, tilting her head sideways so Mars would clearly hear her without them having to make any eye contact. Eye contact wasn't exactly good when all she could do was barely keep from crying.  
  
Trinity turned and forced herself to slowly walk back to her room after Mars closed his door, looking severely disgruntled. She even made sure her steps were measured, not too rushed or too slow. It was better if Mars thought he hadn't even fazed her. But once she closed the door to her room and locked it, she collapsed. Neo, who had been sitting at her terminal and blearily gazing at some files, turned around in shock. Trinity had curled up on the bed, sobbing.  
  
"What happened? What's wrong?" He asked, coming to sit beside her and putting arm around her waist.  
  
"Mars is such an asshole. He slapped me, because I said something about our father he didn't like. Like father, like goddamn son…" Trinity trailed off, starting to cry again.  
  
"What are we going to do? He can't push you around, you're commanding officer," Neo said, tightening his hold on Trinity's waist. It was a little too hard.  
  
"AHH! Don't do that. It hurts," Trinity said miserably, inching forward a little. Neo moved his arm higher and became gentler.  
  
"Wait. Stand up for a sec," Neo said, rising behind Trinity. She did likewise, wondering what he was doing. "Can you point where he…hit you?" Neo said, settling his hands on her hips.  
  
"Here. He hit me pretty hard, just as I was walking out…" Trinity's voice was clogged with tears and she waved her hand around her right side, high on her back. Neo put his hand on the spot, pulling away when he felt her stiffen in pain.  
  
"Is there a bruise?" Trinity asked, fearing someone else might notice if there was. Neo lifted her shirt a little, catching a glimpse of the pale, drawn skin on her hip. As his eyes followed the noticeable line of her spine, he saw there really was a streak of darkness on her back. He pulled her under the light. The bruise was bluish and sort of brown, contrasting with Trinity's ivory skin.  
  
"Yeah. A dark one at that," Neo said, dropping his hand and backing away to lean against the wall.  
  
"What are you going to do?" He asked, staring at his feet.  
  
"Oh shit. I challenged him to combat at noon in the Construct today. And neglected to remember that I can't plug in for another 2 and a half weeks. Dammit, dammit, dammit!" Trinity said, wringing her hands and staring at the ceiling in angst.  
  
"Come on, Trin. Let's go hassle Phase and Romy, ok?" Neo said, thinking that if the two physicians of the ship allowed Trinity to plug in all problems would be solved.  
  
"Sure."  
  
***  
  
"Morpheus. I have a concern." Orion stood at the door to Morpheus' room. It was not long after Trinity and Neo had gone to find Phase and Romy. Morpheus was sitting on his bunk, head against the wall, eyes closed. He looked wise. "Go on," Morpheus said without opening his eyes.  
  
"Romy and I were talking last night, and we noticed a few things. So we decided that maybe you should put some room between Trinity and Mars," Orion said, lingering in Morpheus' doorway.  
  
"That's good. Did Romy get to this point by intuition?" Morpheus asked, opening his eyes and sitting up.  
  
"Yes. I saw the situation in empathy, mostly apathy from Trinity, and some desperation from Mars. But Romy saw things quite clearly. He claims his intuition showed him how there would be a big fight between the two, maybe even coming to blows…so we want to take some precautions," Orion explained. Orion was empathic and somewhat in tune with people's feelings even if they weren't verbalized. He'd been trained by the Oracle herself to interpret things like expression, body language and semantics in order to prevent fights on board the Neb. Romy, on the other hand, was more perceptive, but less trained. He often had visions of upcoming events if he was a witness to the precursor. After Romy was unplugged, he explained how he'd talked to and seen Era many times before Morpheus finally took her out of the Matrix, and that was how he knew what was coming when the Neb's crew unplugged him as well.  
  
"I see. I will approach the idea with Trinity today. Thank you, Orion. Please let Romy know I am grateful for his insight as well," Morpheus said nodding and heading out the door after Orion in the hope of getting breakfast before the mess hall became crowded.  
  
***  
  
"Phase! You have to let me plug in today!! Please," Trinity said, wasting no time with preamble as she assailed Phase on the promenade of the upper deck, Neo at her back.  
  
"To the Matrix? Hell no!" Phase said, running a hand through her spiked hair and making a face. She hated it when patients go impatient.  
  
"No, no. I need to get into the Construct. I've got a…challenge with someone. It was arranged prior, so I forgot about it," Trinity said in a rush, eyeing her boots.  
  
"You can't, hon. It'll hurt like all hell both when they plug you in and wake you up. You'll have a sore head for a week afterward," Phase said in her lilting tone. Romy appeared beside her.  
  
"She's right. You can't…it'll only delay your full recovery longer. Who did you challenge?" Romy asked the question with a raised eyebrow, a smirk, and the posturing of someone who could see through all the lies.  
  
"I…Mars."  
  
"Oh shit." Phase winced.  
  
"Dang! Family rivalry! No one likes Papa?" Romy said knowingly, but still nodding to wish Trinity good luck in her arguments.  
  
"That wasn't it, Trin," Neo said in an aside, audible only to Trinity.  
  
"I know," She whispered back, squeezing her eyes shut and reopening them with new hope.  
  
"Could you put local anesthesia at the base of my skull? Wouldn't that dull the pain?" Trinity asked, posing to the question to Phase rather than Romy, knowing that Romy would make some comment if she asked him.  
  
"Maybe. Want to try?" Phase had said this trying to intimidate Trinity with the prospect of pain, but that was a solid mistake.  
  
"Hell yeah. Let's go!" Trinity said, grinning, and leaving Phase at a loss. They walked towards the infirmary quickly. Once there, Romy had Trinity sit on the table and injected her twice with Novocain on either side of her head plug. She winced at the pain of the shots each time and was so nervous she cut her palms squeezing her fits so tight.  
  
"Okay. This isn't really the spike you'd use to enter the Construct, but it's the same size. Yell if it hurts," Phase said, motioning for Trinity to lie down. She rammed the spike into Trinity's head.  
  
"Ah! Oh…okay, it only hurt at the beginning. Just a little, and then it went away," Trinity said, rubbing her neck after sitting up. She couldn't feel anything.  
  
"Good. Now, go kick his ass. And here's my hint to you, courtesy of my intuition: Make a wager on something before you fight. A bet will put your brother over the edge," Romy said to Trinity alone, adding a smile and taking Phase's hand on the way out of the infirmary. Neo and Trinity were left standing alone in the doorway. Trinity stared down the hall in the direction of the crew's loading chairs where Mars paced nervously, nibbling a fingernail, and staring at the metal grating he walked on. It reminded her of what Mouse had been doing when she'd first saw Neo fight Morpheus in the Construct. Oh, that's a long time ago. Wake up, she thought to herself. Trinity purposefully strode over to Mars.  
  
"Let's go. Now," Trinity said, walking right up to Mars, crossing her arms and looking him in the eye.  
  
"What? It's only 10 o'clock," Mars said, his voice catching.  
  
"So? What're you going to do, pace and worry for another two hours? Besides, I can't wait," Trinity added mockingly, hoping to aggravate her opponent.  
  
"You said twelve," Mars said, his face settling into a mask of coldness.  
  
"I'm saying now. You don't look too willing, so I'll up the stakes," Trinity said with an air of importance, realizing now was the time to take Romy up on his 'hint'. "If you win, you can stay on the Neb as long as you like, and you'll even earn my tolerance. But if I win, you leave this ship as soon as possible and I spread dislike for your name all over the Real World," Trinity said, matching Mars' coldness with her own.  
  
"You dare to try to kick me off the ship…fine! Let's fight now. Tank!" Mars called, lying down in the closest chair. Neo walked over to him, looking at mars like he was something unpleasant he'd found on his shoe.  
  
"That one's mine, Mars," Neo said passively, as if he expected Mars to comply, and Mars did, but with a look of outrage on his face. Even he wouldn't attack the One.  
  
Neo furthered Mars' anger by sliding his arms around Trinity and kissing her passionately, (eyes closed and all,) right there in front of everyone: Tank, Morpheus, Romy, Phase, Era, Slip, and Orion. Mars climbed into the chair on the opposite side of Trinity, avoiding Neo's seat like it was the plague.  
  
"Oh sure, you can use my place, Mars," Romy said sarcastically, boring holes into Mars with his pale gray eyes. But Mars was undaunted. He sat down anyway. Slip walked up to Trinity and carefully slid the jack into her skull, but when he reached Mars he rammed the plug in uncaringly.  
  
"Okay, people. Which would you prefer- tae kwon do, jujitsu, street fighting, karate, or kung fu? We also have firearms practice, sword fighting, knife throwing, and kick boxing. It's the victim's choice of combat method, by the way. That's our rule." Tank's voice permeated the white emptiness of the Construct. Trinity stood staring at Mars, wearing her usual black leather flares and tiny black leather tank. He was dressed in black slacks and a gray t-shirt.  
  
"I choose kung-fu. Tank, can we have a full size studio?" Mars asked, clenching his fists experimentally.  
  
"Sure…there you are," Tank said, and the two found themselves in a wooden paneled room about 20 feet high, with white silk sheeting hung from the wall on one side and gray silk sheeting on the opposite wall. The floor was hardwood and the ceiling painted drywall. Trinity recognized her surroundings- this was the same studio she'd beaten Cypher in just after he was unplugged, during his training. She'd been on the white side of the room. Hate flared up inside even now, as she remembered Cypher's betrayal and his poor fighting skills. Thanks, Tank. Trinity thought to herself. You played up my advantage without Mars' knowledge….  
  
But there was no time to think…as Mars came at her with a vicious kinfehand and a rising backfist, his limbs moving faster than most eyes could follow. She slid into a hook stance and raised her arms in defense, aiming a fast mantis strike at Mars after glancing past his attack with an inverted push block.  
  
He took a stealthy step back, his shock registering not on his face but in the weak power of his next attack: an elbow break combined with a front snap kick meant for Trinity's solar plexus. She blocked easily with an eagle trap block and a knife block, rendering Mars onto the defense. Trinity responded with a fast kicking set- a front flair kick, a reverse crescent, a high roundhouse and a spinning back kick that could have broken Mars' ribs, had it connected. He barely blocked his opponent's blows, alternating between a reverse dragon defense and a lance block. Suddenly he leapt at her, trying very hard to connect a fully lethal butterfly kick to her head- but missing when she fell, rolled and reopened attack in shockingly fast succession. Trinity assumed a reverse hook stance and slammed a phoenix eye strike right into Mars' solar plexus, followed by a wicked side thrust kick that sent Mars sprawling onto the shiny hardwood floor, back first. She finished up with a perfectly aimed mantis thrust to his forehead- that she reluctantly halted right before Mars' eyes. His horrified expression said it all.  
  
"I train with Neo," Trinity growled, allowing a cold, unassuming smile to show. Mars flipped to his feet, her insolence igniting his fury.  
  
Trinity back away from him, easing into an open dragon tail stance just before Mars struck out and painfully connected an inverted ridgehand strike to Trinity's lower left ribs. Trinity gasped in agony as she slid down the floor on her side, stopping close to the wall bearing the white silk banner. She spat blood on the floor and hauled herself into a defensive kneeling stance, using Morpheus' time-honored gesture of 'come and get it' by holding out her hand, palm up, and motioning with her fingers. Mars sprinted towards her- completely without precision- and she used his ignorance and anger to her advantage, smoothly rolling onto her right side and executing a sharp reverse sweep with her left foot. He fell, his legs fairly cut out from under him. Trinity had connected with the backs of his calves. With this one simple blow, she'd sufficiently dazed Mars, therefore allowing enough time for her to get up and properly position herself into a tiger stance. Wisely so, she chose to use the defensive form- because when Mars recovered, he tried to take her down with a slower-than-normal corkscrew punch, which she easily threw off using a strong iron forearm block. This is too much, Trinity thought to herself as she stifled Mars' offensive with a smooth dragon strike to his midsection. Mars lay back in defeat. Trinity stood up, brushed herself off and went through the motions of a series of stances, ending with a complex seven star bow. "You-" Trinity spat at Mars, holding her side in reaction to the dull pain there, "can bow to me in front of the rest of the crew when you're unplugged." She limped off to the white side of the studio, and reached up- rather painfully- to remove the banner of white silk from the wall. "Tank? Can I have a knife?" Trinity asked, blinking back tears. A silver and black switchblade appeared on the floor next to her. She picked it up and with a sure hand sliced the white banner in to three pieces. This is for Cypher. She cut a gash in the center of the first piece, dropping it behind her. This is for Mars. She did likewise in the second piece, throwing it behind her on the opposite side. This, Trinity thought bitterly, is for my father. She struck a long, ragged hole in the last piece of perfect white silk and rose to her feet, stepping on it, leaving a black footprint over the slash. Where the dirt had come from, she didn't know- the hardwood floor was perfectly clean. But she didn't bother thinking about it, because soon after she opened her eyes and saw the ceiling of the Neb. Neo's face loomed into view as her vision wavered. She felt his arms lifting her up and she leaned against him.  
  
"I beat him. Stupid son-of-a…" Trinity's voiced wavered as she flickered out of consciousness for a moment. Romy hurried over to Trinity's side, bearing a syringe filled with white liquid.  
  
"I probably shouldn't be doing this, but I have a feeling she'll want to savor victory, so what the hell," Romy said, injecting a strong stimulant into the thick vein in Trinity's neck. Suddenly her eyes opened. "Whoa!" she said, now able to sit up alone. Neo stood next to her and turned to face Mars as Orion bent to unplug him.  
  
"Ow. Oh man…holy shit," Mars groaned, easing out of his chair and almost collapsing on the floor. No one moved to help him, so he leaned against the chair instead. He couldn't meet Trinity's eyes. She watched him touch his lips and saw blood on his fingertips. Did I do that? She thought abstractedly, now aware she was bleeding herself.  
  
"No one hits Trinity and goes unpunished. I heard about the feud this morning, Mars. And even if you did win that match I still would have thrown you off the Neb. The Napoleon will dock with us in two days," Morpheus said, regally leaving the bridge. "I knew it," Romy whispered. Orion, Era, Slip, and Tank left with him. Mars, Neo, Trinity, Romy and Phase were left alone.  
  
"Wow! That was great, Trin. Can you show me that cool dragon strike? I bet I could nail Morpheus with that one!" Phase said, sounding excited. The stimulant was beginning to wear off, and Trinity smiled as she leaned against Neo on her way back to the infirmary.  
  
"It's a couple shots of anesthesia, a sedative, and a good dinner for you, my dear," Romy said when Trinity was getting her shots in the medical bay. Phase grinned. She loved it when he showed his whimsical side.  
  
"Hmm. Thanks, Romy," Trinity said, yawning.  
  
***  
  
"I have a question," Neo said. He and Trinity were lying in her bed, pressed as close as possible. Neo had him arms around Trinity's waist and Trinity was resting her head on the hollow of his shoulder. "What were you doing with that white banner and the knife? People kept asking me about that like I knew what you were thinking," Neo mused, resting his cheek in Trinity's hair.  
  
"I was getting rid of the past. I cut one for Cypher, one for Mars and one for my father," Trinity said quietly, her thoughts focused on Neo, not her struggles.  
  
"Oh. I see. Now, will the past be haunting you any further?" Neo asked, trying hard to sound wise.  
  
"No, I don't think so," Trinity said, smiling in the dark.  
  
"Good, that's great. So now I get more time with you," Neo said. And they began to kiss. 


End file.
